Corruption: abuse of the position of power
I begin the essay with the following saying "Power has a tendency to corrupt itself and the absolute power to corrupts absolutely". This is the famous phrase of Lord John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton (1843-1902), always cited in corruption contexts. which publishes five volumes about the history of the potatoes of the time of the Protestant reform. In this work he showed how they, contrary to Christian principles, abused their position of power and justified their immoral actions appealing to their religious function, because, in the words of Dalberg-Acton "the function sanctifies its bearer". This fact led him to affirm that absolute power is absolutely.
The term power has multiple definitions and uses. This word, as many of you will know, is used to describe the faculty, skill, capacity or authorization to carry out a certain action. Power also implies having greater body and intellectual strength, in relation to another individual and overcoming it in a physical struggle or in a discussion, but we ask ourselves of corruption? , We will say that it is the use of power for their own benefit. The benefit can be money, influence, projection, special treatment. Corrupt is the one who bribes or agrees to be bribed, to guarantee benefits for himself, for a party or for the government. The key point is the abuse of the position of power in practice, it consists in making abuse of power or means to take an economic or other benefit. Then we ask ourselves. The corruption of power? o The power of corruption?
The corruption of power is in itself a moral corruption of the person/s, and we can define it as the practice and use of the functions and means of organizations, especially public, for benefit, economic or other nature, of its managers, and given the ambiguity of its genesis, it must be considered as a social phenomenon inherent in the human being that, although it can affect a small part of the total of a group, it has a repercussion of great magnitude on the social perception of the phenomenon,When known. Likewise, we must point out that it is always the corruption of public entities that has the greatest social impact since it is the public treasury, owned by all, in the case of the corruption of private entities, where corruption is limited to a limited area andprivate. Starting from this definition we can affirm that all power systems are susceptible to corruption, since the origin of it as a deterioration of social systems lies in the human condition of corruptibility (vulnerability of the human being before corruption) that ends up projecting inSocial power systems.
Based on this we could affirm that there is no completely immune system to the decomposition of power in any field. To a greater or lesser extent of vulnerability, any entity formed by group or groups of individuals can end up being affected by the phenomenon of corruption, in any field and level. The power of corruption is a powerful means to meet the four basic emotional needs that move us: the need for economic security, fun, ambition and position of power, through these four needs as reality is interpreted and feels, reality feels,Many times distorting her to justify what you want to do. We almost always do what we feel and then rationalize what we have done. The power of poorly exercised corruption allows us to create non -solid, non -competitive institutions, to name inefficient and incapable people who have no empowerment, and do not give credit for their achievements: they know how to use power as part of their personal interests.
The corruption of the organization, on the dark side of command are those who cannot name efficient people for fear of shade, have an authoritarian and dominant style, exercise a choleric, impatient, arrogant attitude, little tolerant of errors, do not foreseeThe risks taking the actions very deliberately, show symbols of power as cars, are noticed by the late -fashionable brand or striking clothes, and try to maintain the distances by noticing their hierarchy. While everything indicates that we will have to continue living with the corruption of power? o The power of corruption? Throughout our life as citizens and members of different social entities, nothing prevents new control systems based on the redundancy and reciprocity of controls from being developed in the medium -term future, that is, mechanisms that allow controlling the systems themselvesof control and that in turn they can also be controlled so that absolute control does not fall on a single organ, in short, auditors audit. Obviously, these control mechanisms should be independent and not be integrated into the power systems themselves, since it is ineffective that the same system exerts the self-control function, since in this exercise arbitrary criteria could be established or at least little transparent.
As a young man we ask ourselves: how to overcome corruption? To start corruption, cancer is becoming the economy, hurts the credibility of people, companies and entrepreneurs, discourages the attraction of investment, talent and weakens every attempt to project internationally, as most people say there areto make more hard laws against corruption, improve the judicial system so that these cases do not become eternal and prescribe crimes, or make a true exercise of transparency before citizens. All of that is necessary, but what is absolutely necessary is to change the moral education of citizens.
Let’s not forget that when there is a corrupt, there are also corrupted, corrupible and accomplices, as it is said to always deconfly from the human being, because it is never immune to the abuse of power. In a heterogeneous and diverse society as in which in our countries it prevails, social structures need to be more complex in all its forms, particularly when we refer to power distribution models. In such a context, the division of powers was thought to avoid possible corruption. Control by society, mainly using the media. Always demand transparency in all procedures, punish the corrupt with strong penalties for having committed a especially serious crime: to harm the community. It must be denounced immediately. If corrupt acts are accepted, the risk of that sooner or later the accomplices occurs.
The duty to reject any act of corruption is equivalent to attributing the role of the citizen who cares about collective and not individuals that harm others. The serious changes in people occur within them, when they are taught to think about the consequences of their actions and hopefully this education is carried out as soon as possible in life;Although, on the other hand, it is never too late to achieve it. The majority ignores that negative actions affect, in the first place, those who perform them, due to the damage suffered by their own human nature. Who commits acts of corruption, becomes a corrupt and, increasingly, will be able for greater acts like these.This is human nature, capable of growing by virtue, in valuebeef;But also, unfortunately, capable of growing in vice and evil.
These characteristics have already discovered thousands of years ago Greek thinkers, parents of Western culture. The struggle of corruption of power is not a matter of great wordsdilutants, nor to tear your clothes a few semanas, but to educate: in the family, in school, in the media, in the university, in the company, in the institutions. It is posiBle defeat the corruption that causes so much damage, to the person, their victims and society;But let’s not fool ourselves, without education we will never move forward.
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